LONDON: Next Wednesday, Sept. 30, will be Sovereignty Day in Iraq, a new national holiday created to celebrate the withdrawal of the last US troops from the country after a 23-year presence.<\/p>\n
What Wednesday will not be, despite much speculation to the contrary over the past few months, is the day that Iraq\u2019s multiple pro-Iran militias surrender their weapons to the state.<\/p>\n
Since Iraq\u2019s latest prime minister, Ali Al-Zaidi, took office in May, Sept. 30 has been widely mooted as disarmament day. There has, however, been widespread and mounting skepticism that such a challenging ambition could possibly be achieved in just four months \u2014 and on Saturday, Al-Zaidi acknowledged as much.<\/p>\n
Just 11 days before the supposed deadline, in an exclusive interview in Baghdad with The New York Times, he laid out a new timeline for disarmament, committed to a new deadline \u2014 June 30, 2027 \u2014 and bought himself another nine months.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is not something that is optional,\u201d Al-Zaidi said. \u201cIt is a necessity.\u201d<\/p>\n
His nation, he added, was determined \u201cto build bridges and economic ties between Iraq and the countries of the world. Under this government, Iraq will be a meeting point, not a point of hostility.\u201d<\/p>\n
All that will happen now on Sept. 30 is the unveiling of a detailed timeline for disarmament. This, Al-Zaidi said, will begin with a 90-day period during which the militias would carry out no attacks, and in return would not be attacked by the US.<\/p>\n
After this, the process of disarming would begin, culminating on June 30, at which point the militias would cease to exist and their members \u201cwill join the Popular Mobilization Forces as individuals and integrate into them.\u201d Any groups that refuse \u201cwill be deemed outlaws.\u201d<\/p>\n The evaporation of the Sept. 30 deadline comes as no surprise, said Lahib Higel, deputy director of the Middle East and North Africa program at the International Crisis Group.<\/p>\n \u201cAnyone who has followed any kind of disarmament, demobilization and integration process anywhere in the world knows that they don\u2019t happen on a specific date unless you\u2019ve come very far into a negotiating process,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, the whole idea that this was going to happen on that day was unrealistic to start with; not to mention the fact that you have a handful of groups that are publicly declaring that they won\u2019t disarm.\u201d<\/p>\n But there is no doubt that the announcement of the new deadline for disarmament represented a climbdown by Al-Zaidi in the face of the realities of a complex security and militia landscape in Iraq.<\/p>\n It will also have ruffled feathers in Washington, which was putting pressure on Iraq to break ties with Iran, opposed any role for the militias in Iraq\u2019s government, and had been personally assured by Al-Zaidi that disarmament would be linked to the US withdrawal.<\/p>\n As recently as June, an Iraqi government spokesman said there was a \u201cdeadline \u2026 a time marker after which the reasons for unregulated weapons end, which is the end of September, the end of the International Coalition\u2019s presence.\u201d<\/p>\n On July 15, two months after becoming prime minister, Al-Zaidi departed from Iraq on his first overseas visit, bound for Washington. There, he received a warm welcome from US President Donald Trump at the White House and delivered a similar message.<\/p>\n Speaking via an interpreter, Al-Zaidi said that as soon as American troops had left Iraq there would be no remaining justification for the existence of armed militias in the country.<\/p>\n \u201cI have made a decision on this issue and there will be no turning back,\u201d he said. \u201cThere will be no need for any armed factions after Sept. 30.\u201d<\/p>\n Al-Zaidi, a newcomer with no political track record, is well aware that he owes his job to Trump, and that to remain in Washington\u2019s good books he must deliver on his promise to neuter Iran\u2019s friends and proxies in Iraq.<\/p>\n When he took office as prime minister on May 14, he was almost nobody\u2019s first choice for the job, but got it largely thanks to the personal backing by Trump.<\/p>\n After weeks of internal wrangling, Al-Zaidi was nominated as a compromise candidate by the Coordination Framework, the influential coalition of Shiite parties that forms the largest bloc in Iraq\u2019s parliament.<\/p>\n The coalition\u2019s first choice was the former prime minister, Nouri Al-Maliki, but it changed course after a very public and frank intervention by Trump.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m hearing that the Great Country of Iraq might make a very bad choice by reinstalling Nouri Al-Maliki as Prime Minister,\u201d he wrote on social media on Jan. 27.<\/p>\n The last time Al-Maliki was in power, Trump added, the country \u201cdescended into poverty and total chaos. That should not be allowed to happen again.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause of his insane policies and ideologies, if elected, the United States of America will no longer help Iraq.\u201d<\/p>\n Al-Maliki, who was prime minister from 2006 until 2014, is leader of the Islamic Dawa Party. After Iran\u2019s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, was killed in an Israeli airstrike on Tehran in February, Al-Maliki was among the Shiite leaders who pledged allegiance to his successor, Mojtaba Khamenei.<\/p>\n The political class in Iraq had already been left in no doubt that Washington was determined to curb the influence of Iran-linked political parties in the country.<\/p>\n Four days before Trump\u2019s remarks, stories had started to circulate that the US government had threatened senior Iraqi politicians with sanctions if any armed groups linked to Iran were included in the country\u2019s next government.<\/p>\n According to sources cited by Reuters in a report on Jan. 23, the US named 58 members of Iraq\u2019s parliament whom it said should play no part in government. If they did, the US would block cash flows from Iraqi oil sales, which are vital for its economy.<\/p>\n The rumored threat to Iraqi sovereignty seemed fanciful \u2014 until a spokesperson for the US State Department all but confirmed it.<\/p>\n \u201cThe United States supports Iraqi sovereignty, and the sovereignty of every country in the region,\u201d the spokesperson told Reuters. \u201cThat leaves absolutely no role for Iran-backed militias that pursue malign interests, cause sectarian division, and spread terrorism across the region.\u201d<\/p>\n Many, although not all, of the parties under the umbrella of the Coordination Framework have close ties to Iran. Nevertheless, the coalition took the US threats seriously and turned to Al-Zaidi as a compromise candidate whose appointment would appease Washington.<\/p>\n \u201cMark my words, I knew what I was doing,\u201d Trump said as he sat alongside Al-Zaidi in the Oval Office.<\/p>\n \u201cThis man is going to be a great leader in the Middle East, beyond Iraq. His influence is going to spread all throughout the Middle East.\u201d<\/p>\n But the narrowness of the tightrope Al-Zaidi must walk was emphasized when, just over a week after his visit to the White House, he flew to Tehran for his first meeting with Iranian leaders, including President Masoud Pezeshkian.<\/p>\n The official Iraqi News Agency reported that the meetings and various memorandums of understanding that were signed during his visit were focused on foreign affairs, finance and energy supplies; Iraq is heavily reliant on Iranian electricity and gas.<\/p>\n But without doubt, Iran\u2019s insistence that Iraq\u2019s pro-Tehran militias should be allowed to keep their weapons will have been at the top of the agenda. As recently as Sunday, Al Arabiya reported that \u201cIran is pressuring Iraqi armed factions not to surrender their weapons.\u201d<\/p>\n Iraq\u2019s problem with pro-Iranian militias took root in the summer of 2014, when Shiite cleric Ali Al-Sistani called on Iraqis to take up arms and defend their country against Daesh, which had overwhelmed the Iraqi army, seized a third of the country\u2019s territory and come within striking distance of Baghdad.<\/p>\n Many heeded the call and joined Shiite armed groups, which Al-Maliki, the prime minister at the time, attempted to bring under state control by grouping under an umbrella organization called the Popular Mobilization Forces, also known as PMF, or Hashd Al-Shaabi.<\/p>\n Al-Zaidi\u2019s attempt to bring the multiple elements of the PMF to heel is not the first. His predecessors, prime ministers Haider Al-Abadi and Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani, both tried and failed \u2014 and there is little to suggest Al-Zaidi will have any more success.<\/p>\n The issue now, as before, is not only about disarmament; to its fighters and their families, the PMF has become a state within a state, providing salaries and welfare benefits, while several of its component organizations have inserted themselves into Iraq\u2019s political fabric.<\/p>\n As recently as Sept. 6, Qasim Al-Araji, Iraq\u2019s former national security adviser and now Al-Zaidi\u2019s personal security adviser, told the state-owned TV channel Al Iraqiya that three groups had already given up their weapons: Saraya Al-Salam, Asaib Ahl Al-Haq and Kataib Imam Ali.<\/p>\n Five others, he said, were still negotiating: Harakat Hezbollah Al-Nujaba, Kataib Sayyid Al-Shuhada, Kataib Hezbollah, Saraya Awliya Al-Dam and Ashab Al-Kahf. Others, however, are not.<\/p>\n In an analysis published on Sept. 15, the UK-based crisis management company MS Risk concluded that \u201cthe division is not random. The compliant three each possess an established political vehicle through which influence survives disarmament,\u201d whereas \u201cthe five holdouts are those most closely associated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and least dependent on electoral politics.\u201d<\/p>\n As a consequence, it said, \u201cdisarmament is therefore likely to record its clearest successes among the factions whose weapons pose the least risk to the state, while the groups responsible for cross-border attacks remain outside the framework.\u201d<\/p>\n The difficulties inherent in treading the line between Washington and Tehran were laid bare on Aug. 17, when government counterterrorism forces arrested Abbas Hussein Matar, the head of intelligence for pro-Iran militia Harakat Al-Nujaba.<\/p>\n Matar, who was suspected of involvement in operations targeting US forces in Iraq, was released within 48 hours, following threats from his militia.<\/p>\n On Aug. 18, a spokesperson for the group told Erbil-based news site The New Region that \u201cwe will not surrender our weapons, as they are the instrument that has protected and continues to protect the Iraqi people from aggression.\u201d<\/p>\n The main barrier to progress, Higel believes, is Iran\u2019s ongoing conflict with the US.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think that this (disarmament) process will be over during Zaidi\u2019s term,\u201d she said. \u201cIt will take longer than that because we\u2019re talking about dozens of groups. Most of them are fairly easy to deal with, in the sense that you can probably strike individual deals with them, as the government has already started doing.<\/p>\n \u201cBut the main problem is with the handful of groups that just refuse to disarm and won\u2019t do so as long as Iran is at war with the US.\u201d<\/p>\n Even the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq \u201cdoesn\u2019t actually remove the justification for the Iran-backed factions that subscribe to the \u2018Axis of Resistance,\u2019 of which there are four or five in Iraq, to retain their arms,\u201d Higel added.<\/p>\n \u201cThese groups subscribe to Tehran\u2019s idea that in order to have a stable region that does not constitute a threat to us, we need to rid West Asia of all American presence.\u201d<\/p>\n Caroline Rose, a senior director at The Soufan Center whose work focuses on security and defense in the Middle East and North Africa, agrees with this assessment.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is clear that, other than a select few elements of the Hashd Al-Shaabi, the majority oppose the concept of disarmament,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile militias have, over the years, made their goal complete US withdrawal from Iraqi territory, they won\u2019t suddenly fold now that US forces are pulling out from the country. Their unstated intent is lasting, competing sociopolitical, security and economic influence and agency in Iraq.<\/p>\n \u201cElements of the Hashd network also understand that while this new Iraqi administration seeks to look tough on militia networks, particularly to appease the US, they possess both leverage and creative loopholes to bypass disarmament.\u201d<\/p>\n In a sense, according to Sir John Jenkins, a former British ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Syria, the PMF has already got its way.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen people from the Hashd talk about \u2018demobilization and disarmament,\u2019 they really mean integration into the Iraqi armed forces,\u201d he told Arab News.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s already happened to a large extent, with most of the big militia groups already having brigade numbers and a dedicated budget authorized by the state. What that means is that they have already more or less achieved a reverse takeover of the state.\u201d<\/p>\n There are, he added, \u201csmaller factions that don\u2019t like this because they don\u2019t benefit as much, but they\u2019ll eventually be smacked around by the big boys until they do what they\u2019re told.\u201d<\/p>\n Worse still, \u201cthey\u2019ll become diffusion franchises, useful for deniable ops against rivals, the Saudis, the US, Israel \u2014 whoever the militia leaders and their Iranian backers want to strike without being struck themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"Members](\"https:\/\/assets.maestronewsroom.com\/media\/30f6532d-717b-4366-9158-9c455299fcd9\/1790075875471-96600f8cd5541278.JPG\")
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